Questions and answers

Chamber and committees

Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for ��˿�� to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S6W-11051

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 21 September 2022
Current Status: Answered by John Swinney on 30 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how much Ferguson Marine is expected to pay for the ship towing contract that was published on 15 September 2022.

Question reference: S6W-11005

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Tuesday, 20 September 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 30 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will consider suspending Workplace Parking Levy regulations while businesses and workers are impacted by the cost of living crisis.

The power to implement Workplace Parking Licencing schemes was provided in The Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 (Part 7), and The Workplace Parking Licensing (Scotland) Regulations 2022 were laid before parliament in January this year. The regulations, which provide technical framework for local authorities, came in to effect on 4 March 2022. Decisions on whether to implement a Workplace Parking Licencing scheme will be made by local authorities. To date, no local authority has formally proposed a scheme under the regulations.

Question reference: S6O-01439

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 28 September 2022
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 6 October 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to revive the bus industry following a slump in passenger numbers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Question reference: S6W-10653

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 29 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 27 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what percentage of ScotRail passenger journeys have been made with (a) an ordinary fare and (b) a season ticket since January 2022, broken down by month.

Question reference: S6W-10968

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 September 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 23 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government when the Minister for Transport will next meet representatives from Glasgow Airport to discuss any challenges facing Scotland's aviation industry.

Question reference: S6W-10967

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 08 September 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 23 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government when the Minister for Transport last visited Glasgow Airport.

Question reference: S6W-10655

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 29 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 23 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide a breakdown of ScotRail’s rail passenger revenue from 1 January to 31 July 2022.

Prior to the 1st April 2022, ScotRail services were operated by Abellio ScotRail. Under the terms of the franchise agreement, revenue figures for the period are commercially confidential. The published accounts for Abellio ScotRail for this period will be found at Companies House in due course.

For the period after 1st April, relevant revenue figures will not be available until the annual accounts for ScotRail Trains Ltd. have been audited, verified and published after the end of the financial year 2022-23.

Question reference: S6W-10654

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 29 August 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 20 September 2022

To ask the Scottish Government how many passenger journeys were made on ScotRail trains from January to July 2022, broken down by month.

Question reference: S6W-09822

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Monday, 18 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Jenny Gilruth on 5 August 2022

To ask the Scottish Government what the cost of the recent pay agreement with train drivers is, which budgets the money will come from and whether any other budgets will have to be cut in order to finance the settlement.

Question reference: S6W-09690

Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 08 July 2022
Current Status: Answered by Patrick Harvie on 29 July 2022

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on how many free bicycles it has provided to children, broken down by local authority, and how much has been spent on this scheme to date.

We met the commitment to begin providing free bikes to schoolchildren within 100 days of the new Government by commencing the ongoing pilot programme. The pilot programme is, by its nature, focused in scope with 9 projects testing a range of delivery models. We aim to roll the programme out more widely in 2023.

The pilot period will conclude at the end of August 2022. The projected spend to the end of the pilot period is £2,601,356.22. This is £870,369.34 resource and £1,730,986.88 capital. The resource element of the budget is not used to procure bikes, but to fund activity such as training sessions and staffing to support the objectives of the pilot programme.

The total number of bikes issued to date is 2067. We expect to have issued 3000 bikes by the end of the pilot period. The bikes include adapted and non-standard bikes to cater for a range of needs.

In addition, fleet bikes delivered by Sustrans Scotland to participating schools, but not given to any individual child, have been used 2927 times.

We do not record data on bike numbers at local authority level. However, considering bikes issued and associated training and promotion sessions, free bikes activities have taken place in 20 of 32 local authority areas. The 9 pilots are running across a range of locations including in urban, rural and island communities.

Month	Ordinary Fare (%)	Season ticket (%)
January	88.7	11.3
February	87.5	12.5
March	87.3	12.7
April	90.4	9.6
May	90.6	9.4
June	89	11
July	89.6	10.4
August	90.8	9.2

Month	Passenger Journeys
January	3,333,231
February	4,181,588
March	5,279,142
April	5,140,954
May	5,157,588
June	4,209,012
July	5,081,336